Harder Than Easy
by Genevieve22
Summary: He was harder than easy but she was always good with riddles and puzzles


_He was harder than easy but she was always good with riddles and puzzles._

It's raining again. Pitter-patter of drops and droplets playing a melancholic melody on the rooftop of this dump, lonely and wrecked place. He hates this place, he truly does. Spinner's End. Eleven letters. One sound that still gives his shadders even after almost three decades of walking cynism that has been his life. Cynism, Occlumency, and total and complete indifference. He decided not to care about anything, just living his dull days, step by step, breath by breath, hour by hour.

Right after he woke up in the Infirmary of St. Mungo, he cursed under his breath - he hoped not to survive, he hoped to enter the world of the Dead and to finally try to repent. The burden of his sins was too heavy to even try to bear, so the death might have been his salvation, but... There is always this goddamned "but" - he was Severus fucking Snape - former Death Eater, walking and breathing terror of all living, the greatest cynic of all cynical, and still, they proclaimed him a Hero, the Savior of their world! Pathetic. He swore under his breath and closed his eyes - the world could go hang itself, he was retiring.

He was never this close to admitting defeat: this Granger-girl, this unsufferable Know-it-all, this bushy-haired and whiskey-eyed breathing horror, or Sweet Salazar! She saved him. She made his wreckage of a life full of vague sense and desperate hope. She was the one who gave him the antidote from Nagini's poison, and she was the one to find him laying broken on the floor in the Shrieking Shack. Yes, sure, he was the one to brew this damn antidote in a vague attempt to save his own poor image of life, but he never meant to use it properly. Severus Snape had no intention to go on living. Sure, he had one buzzing thought inside his mind: if, just what if the fate would be favorable to him and give him one last chance to get out of here alive, what if he tried to escape the wizarding world completely, to hide, mind you all, professional spy did know a thing or two about how to stay hidden, and start his life all over again? Severus cherished this thought when there left nothing more to cherish.

So it rained, and he breathed heavily, and there was cold and damp and darkness, and Merlin, he was pathetic! But she was there, this stupid girl with terrible teeth and crazy hair, oh how he hated her!

She knelt near him, opening the bottle with the antidote, she cried, she begged... Foolish Know-It- All!

Sure, he didn't intend to thank her for saving his life, he was Severus Snape, after all, he didn't have any feelings, nor ever he thanked anyone for anything.

He stayed in the dull room of St. Mungo, staring at the ceiling. Hate and postponed resentment is everything he's got. She came every day and stayed until the very evening. She smiled, she told him stories, she wished him a speedy recovery, she took the liberty to take care of his home. She is a War-Heroine now, after all, she has her right for some liberties. And he hates her, this is the only feeling he mastered through the decades of his lifeless life.

_"You __are __harder than easy, you know" - she said one day._

_"And this is news, because..." - he sneered._

_"I saved your life!"_

_"What do you want? A medal?"_

So she left and he got what he desired - empty days and even emptier nights full of hatred, loathing, and regret.

She was young and beautiful, foolish Gryffindor with a tendency to believe in fairytale endings. He was a Slyziren with a tendency to never give up because giving up was never his way. She'd better be without him. She could play the princess somewhere else where she would be needed and better cherished.

They let him go, and he returned to his old and hateful home. He started brewing again, he started smoking and trying to make amends with his past and present. He started to try to get over his own walls of desperation.

Autumn had come and it was raining, and Severus was smoking through the open window and there was she, sitting on his wrecked bench under the old cherry-tree and rain was soaking her cloak. She was crying. He heard the rumors: her parents never made to Britain again and she failed the Memory Charm, such a tragedy to Ever-Know-It-All! And why did he even care?

The door banged open. His hand snatched her gloved fingers. His dark eyes shot her daggers. She chocked and cried harder.

_"Come. I don't want you to die under my cherry-tree" - he snarled._

_"Why?" - she hesitated._

_"You saved my life, after all"._

She never questioned his intentions before, so she followed him inside like a stray puppy she always reminded him of. Hermione drank his tea and cried on his shoulder, talking about her parents, and her broken career due to the lack of NEWTs, and her break up with this fool of Weasley boy, she blubbered and he listened. For the first time with interest and lack of snarling and painful comments. After all, his house was cold and he was bored and life had no meaning.

So his hands found their way under her blouse, and her tear-stained lips touched his mouth, and his fingers entwined with her tangled curls and she sighed happily. He was never the pity-sex type and it was exactly what they needed that rainy autumn night in the middle of the nothingness that became their post-war future.

_He was harder than easy but she was always good with riddles and puzzles._

And it's raining again. Pitter-patter of drops and droplets playing a melancholic melody on the rooftop of this place he calls home now, and she sits in front of the fireplace listening to the rainy song outside. Twelve months passed. They spent a year full of anger, hatred, mutual misunderstanding, hesitation, vagueness, make-up sex, self-pity, and loathing, understanding, tenderness, respect, and love. And he learned to live with his past, he doesn't need it anymore. After all, love appeared not as scary as he always feared. And she taught him how to love again.

_"At __the __end of the day when you're lonely_

_After begging to be left alone_

_You can look at this world as your kingdom _

_If you want you can make me your home"_


End file.
